Nick Clegg: hero of The Nation

Has an entryist plot to take over Britain been hatched at the heart of America’s left-wing establishment? Perhaps so. The Nation is the US’s oldest continuously published weekly magazine, founded in 1865. But to the celebrated list of progressive scribes who have earned their spurs there—including Naomi Klein, Christopher Hitchens and Calvin Trillin—must now be added another name: Nick Clegg. Clegg, who recently admitted being “very, very left wing” when younger, interned at the magazine in 1990, during Hitchens’s time there. But that is not all: a year earlier one Ed Miliband also joined their internship programme. Given both now stand at least a fleeting chance of being Britain’s next PM, The Nation itself could gain some influence on the next government. A friend inside the magazine tells Prospect both men spent time laboriously fact-checking articles—good training for putting Britain’s dubious public finances back in order.

This item appears in the May issue of Prospect, published on Thursday 29th April